StarTalk Radio - #ICYMI - Snowboarding: Shreddin' the Gnar

Episode Date: December 7, 2017

The forecast is for snow, and hosts Gary O’Reilly and Chuck Nice are hitting the slopes for a physics lesson with former pro snowboarder and soap opera star Othello Clark and veteran surfer, snowboarder and skateboard champ Dr. Bill Robertson, aka Dr. Skateboard.Don’t miss an episode of Playing with Science. Subscribe to our channels on:TuneIn: tunein.com/playingwithscienceApple Podcasts: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/playing-with-science/id1198280360GooglePlay Music: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Iimke5bwpoh2nb25swchmw6kzjqSoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/startalk_playing-with-scienceStitcher: http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/startalk/playing-with-scienceNOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can watch or listen to this entire episode commercial-free: https://www.startalkradio.net/all-access/snowboarding-shreddin-the-gnar/ Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ on Apple Podcasts to listen to new episodes ad-free and a whole week early.

I'm Gary O'Reilly. And I'm Chuck Knott. And this is Playing With Science. And today I think we shall all head for the slopes. So wrap up warm, grab a hat, and don't forget your gloves because the forecast is for snow. And by the time we hit the top, it will be all down here. Oh, yeah, it's the turn of snowboarding to by the time we hit the top, it will be all down here.

Oh, yeah. It's the turn of snowboarding to get the PWS treatment. And for that, we've got the band back together. And not for just science, but for the pros eyes view from the top of the mountain. So it'd be welcome back

to Dr. Skateboard, a.k.a. Professor Bill Robertson and former pro snowboarder and regular of the smash hit soap, the bold and the beautiful Mr. Othello Clark. No, not just you and I, Chuck. I was going to say, I thought we were bold and beautiful. Othello.

So, Chuck, you skateboard. I did. I was going to say, let's clear that up. I used to. Snowboard? Never did a snowboard. Never snowboarded. And the reason is I don't like snow. Snowboard? Never snowboarded.

And the reason is I don't like snow. So that puts me at a very distinct disadvantage for skiing and snowboarding. Even though I probably would enjoy snowboarding and maybe even skiing, but I have to tell you that I just don't like snow. Even as a kid, just don't like snow. Even as a kid, I didn't like snow, except for I made money off of it. I had a snow removal service from the time I was 11 to the time I was 14, and I made a crap load of money. You get like Homer Simpson, one of those jackets with Mr. Plow on the back. Oh, Mr. Plow, that's the name.

That name again is Mr. Plow, a.k.a. Chuck. As long as you get to a Simpsons reference, you can't lose. Yeah, everything. All right, enough of that. Dr. Skateboard, Professor Bill Robertson. Hi, Bill. How are you, sir? Hey, Gary.

Hey, Chuck. Good to be on the show again. Oh, you are more than welcome. So great to have you back. All right. Let's just clear this up. Difference between skateboarding and surfing and snowboarding, and is snowboarding somewhere between the two, or is it just completely unique? And on top of that, do you do either snowboarding or surfing?

So my background as a kid, you know, I grew up not too far from the beach. So I first started surfing and water skiing as a kid before I got into skateboarding. So that was kind of my first background into that. And then I started snowboarding in the mid 80s in Flagstaff, Arizona. And so I did figure out the differences between the three quickly. Is it quite simply take the wheels off the skateboard and head downhill or is there a lot more going on? Yeah there's a lot more going on in some ways the main difference I would say is that of course you're strapped into a snowboard and you can freely jump off of

a skateboard and in the other sense what you're going to land into primarily in snowboarding is something softer than concrete. So the, but I think the big thing is a lot of times with skateboarding, the general way you're moving is you're sort of directing it with your front foot, whether you're regular foot or goofy foot, you're sort of pointing your front foot or moving the front truck to get to where you're going and then, you know, moving off the back one, but you're directing almost with your front foot. In snowboarding, you actually do the opposite. You direct more with your back foot. So because you're going downhill the whole time,

your back foot and the edge of the board acts like a rudder, if you think about it, on a boat or something like that where you're driving that in. So you really drive almost snowboarding with your back foot in some ways, and you direct it with your back foot, whereas whereas skateboarding you direct it with your front foot. If I were on a skateboard, which will not happen, just in case you're thinking that'd be a great idea, your center of gravity is fluctuating to do the tricks or to do all the sort of maneuvers. And as you said before, you've got freedom away from the board. Now you are tethered, if you like, to the snowboard. How are you adjusting that center of gravity to make it work for you?

Yeah. So since you're locked into your stance, you're really having to drive your knees together. That's one of the things you do in snowboarding a lot is you kind of pinch your knees together, which you don't always do in skateboarding to keep that center straight. The other thing is you're going to, you know, you're going to lift that, as I mentioned, that back foot. So I'm a regular foot, that would be my right foot. And I'll throw that back foot out, you know, far away from my body, if you will, and counter it with my upper body to the right or to the left to try to make turns. And so that part of keeping your center of gravity, you've got to keep it over the middle of your board.

But sometimes it's easier if you can pinch your knees in some ways together. That will help you lock that center right over your board. When you're turning, if I'm turning to my right, if I'm not mistaken, I've seen guys, they lean right into the turn. And they're, I don't know, almost like a 45 degree angle. That to me just sounds wrong. It should, you normally I'd be leaning away from this issue, but it's not. So can you explain the physics of why, when you start to carve and you lean into that turn? Yeah. So you got to think about it first, you're, you're going downhill. So, you know, leaning back would be a really bad thing. In some

ways, it's not super bad because it'll just slow you down. But when you're going into a turn, yeah, you dig that edge of the snowboard in by driving your toe side into the mountain, and so into the snow. And so you're, in a sense, riding on the steel edge of your snowboarding and lifting, if you will, the contact from the bottom. So at some point, you're riding as much on the steel edge as you can to go as fast as you can through a turn. And that's where you'll see people sort of turn and dip and get closer. And that was the old phrase you used for snowboarders is when they were turning, they were, you know, their hands were getting so close to the ground. People, you know, skiers affectionately called us knuckle draggers, you know.

It wasn't for the way you made your turns. Skiers hate snowboarders. We look at the mountain completely different, you know. So true. at the mountain completely different, you know. So true. But the big thing here was that you are kind of, you know, counterbalancing. You're throwing your weight and leaning on your toe side, let's say to make a turn, and then you're counterbalancing with your arms out in front of you. So you are leaning into it and you're going downhill the whole time. So that's a part of how you're managing your speed. When we started off, Gary asked you this question about the difference

between the three. We, you know, we never really got to that from a physics standpoint. You're looking at traveling on three different mediums, two of which are the same, just in different physical forms, and then the other being concrete. But what is the physics of the mediums upon which you're traveling for the three different sports? traveling for the three different sports? Yeah. So, so start with surfing. I mean, you have a medium that's never the same, right? So it's always changing. You're always adjusting. That's sort of the beauty of it. You know, you're trying to lock into something that is, if you will, alive all around you. So you're, you know, the, so the physics are, you've got something that's in, you know, chaos, right? It's changing all the time and you've got something that's in chaos, right? It's changing all the time. And you've got to manage yourself with micro adjustments or find that flow within that changing medium. For a skateboarder, I think you can really count on the concrete. Once you understand what you're riding on and sort of the hardness or whatever the slickness of it, you can sort of count on what you're going to do and how that's going to behave.

So you can – it's much more predictable in terms of how you're going to adjust. So you probably have to make small – less small adjustments and can be more predictive in what you're going to do. And in snowboarding, it's probably a little bit of both. in what you're going to do. And in snowboarding is probably a little bit of both, you know, I mean, in some ways, the the mountain stays the same. And, you know, but the depth of the snow and the conditions of the snow can change. So if you go from, say, powder to ice, you know, things can change pretty quick. So you have to be a little nimble on that. So I think in terms of the mediums, surfing being the most organic, snowboarding probably being the one that has the next amount of change, and then skateboarding being much more predictive. And then consequently, you have probably less minor adjustments you have to make as you're moving through those sports.

That's interesting because we're talking here about an environmental awareness. So if you go onto the water, it's not just the water surface and the changeability they're in with currents etc you've got wind right you've got every sort of atmosphere around you similar with snow similar with skateboarding that you have to know your environment really well and intuitively before you actually get into all the rest of the enjoyment of that sport yeah that's for sure you know and when I started snowboarding, I had never snowboarded or been on the mountain at all. And my friends told me all about it. And we drove to the mountain and rode up in the chairlift and they dropped me off at the top and

said, see at the bottom kind of thing. And I had to figure it out. And but what I figured out for myself was that, you know, really snowboarding has elements of, of surfing and skateboarding completely. And so when you're driving on the mountain and you're carving, you know, in many ways it is a lot like surfing. You're trying to drive that edge of the board and use the turns and stay over your board. Um, when you're in the air, it's completely skateboarding because all your grabs are named after skateboarding grabs. So your mute, your indie, your front side, your backside. That's right.

And I was very comfortable when that would happen. And then when you land, it's unique. And so that was always the challenge is because suddenly you're actually landing on something that can be soft or hard. And then you're, in a sense, going downhill. So you have to learn to react quickly, either by driving your edge in frontside or backside to gain a turn. So in some ways, having started as a surfer, it helped me being on the mountain as a skateboarder.

It helped me in the air. But when I landed, the only thing that helped me was practice on my snowboard nice nice uh stay with us please uh we're going to take a break so dr bill well no professor bill robertson will be with us when we come back aka dr skateboard also further forward in the show we have othello clark yes that man from bold and the beautiful he'll be on the show too so if you like snowboarding this is a place to be. We will be back very, very shortly. Welcome back. I'm Gary O'Reilly.

And I'm Chuck Knight. And this is Playing With Science. And today we're exploring the science behind snowboarding. And yes. Just like that. That's my carving. That's me carving a mountain right there. And that's from a man who

doesn't like snow that's right like a thanksgiving day turkey as we're skateboarding it started with let's go to the top of the hill and get to the bottom of the hill and we do a bit of slalom and everything else but the tricks came in how did you get involved in the trick side of things when you started to snowboard yeah absolutely, absolutely. Because, you know, the fun thing about snowboarding and being kind of in your bindings the whole time is you didn't really have to worry about, you know, your board getting away from you. So if you got in the air and could, you know, control yourself and control your center of gravity and then deal with the lack of friction when you hit the ground, you were, you know, you could do a lot of things. And

really, for me, that's where my skateboarding background came into play. Because like I said, when you got in the air, you know, you could do all sorts of grabs, maybe that were much easier than doing them on your skateboard, because your feet were stuck on the board. And then going, doing things going forwards and backwards, or for me going, you know, regular foot to goofy foot was a lot of fun. So you could hit a bump, you know, style 180 in the air, land, goofy foot, go, and then hit another bump and come out and do that all the way down the mountain. So yes, skateboarding and the, I mean, excuse me, snowboarding and the tricks were a big draw for me in doing the sport. How did you change with the fact that you can't flip and move around the borders freely as you can on a skateboard in terms of the physics that are applied therein?

Yeah, I think the main thing is, you know, you're bound to your board, even though people at times will, you know, they might unhook from their board to do a certain kind of trick. But, you know, you weren't going to be able to say, do the things you do on a skateboard, like a shove it or a kickflip in a sense. So you were going to do things that did things rotationally. So we talked about centrifugal and centripetal force and moment of inertia. And so when you were spinning in circles

was sort of the way you would do that. And so you see a lot of people doing maybe 360 airs, you saw, you know, 540s, 720s. I mean, people like Sean White, who could do 1080s, you know, those were, that's, that's an incredible, but that was another way you would do that. And then you also learned, people learned they could do things like flips, where, you know, they could spin the 360 rotation, you know, throughout. So, so I think that was a big part of, um, you know, being able to manage the forces of centrifugal centripetal and then keeping your arms either in or out to manage your moment of inertia and to control the rate at which you spin. That's a big

deal in skateboarding. So they have these great big air videos. I mean, they're just gorgeously shot where there are two types that I've seen though. So one, the half pipe itself is built on the mountain and the half pipe itself, and you see this in the Olympics as well, is going downhill. So the half pipe is utilizing gravity. So the half pipe becomes the gravity. But then I've seen these other videos where there's guys doing big air tricks, and it's like a regular skateboard half pipe. And they kind of get their speed up going downhill. Then they go into the pipe, and then they stay in the pipe going back and forth.

What is the difference from a physics standpoint of the stationary, I won't call it stationary because they're all stationary, of the half pipe that is level and the half pipe that uses gravity? And how do you lose energy every single time you go back and forth in the one that is level? So I'll start with the first one, the half pipe that's at a slant where you're going downhill or something like that. You know, so you are, you're using the gravity pulling you down the hill. It's at an angle. It's much easier for you

to maintain speed or even to accelerate as you're going down. And if you watch riders, you know, they'll try to go cleanly on the walls. But the other thing is if they're going too slow, they have to point themselves straight down to get up some speed again. So I would think those kinds of half pipes, which were very traditional, you build it into a hill and you ride down the hill, you hit, you know, five times on each side, and then that's your run. On these other kinds of ones where they're more flat, like you would on a skateboard halfpipe, you're going to have to be much more efficient with your transfer of energy. So you're not going to be able to be, if you will, sloppy in how you pump the transition as you come down, and then as you pump the transition up,

because that's going to be all your momentum. So I would think that, you know, riding downhill in a halfpipe, much more rider friendly. And the other side is you're just losing so much energy each time because you're trying to, you know, generate so much power as you're going up the wall. So, you know, I think moving side to side on a snowboard would be very difficult if it was flat versus going downhill. Would it be possible to get a pump in a level half pipe on a snowboard where you could indefinitely maintain the back and forth? So coming out of the pipe, making your turn, okay, 180, coming back into the pipe, pump at the bottom, coming out of the pipe. Would it be possible or do the laws of physics say, no, you're only going to get so many out of that? Well, I think that's the beauty of

science, right? You would say, you know, hey, is it possible? Let's give it a try and test a hypothesis. But my own personal opinion would be that would be extremely difficult to manage and to keep up because, you know, you're tending to lose so much energy, you know, through the medium. And if it's flat, you know, you can't really pump it in the way that you do on a skateboard with your snowboard because you have these edges that are driving in that'll slow you down as well. So I would think that, you know, if you watch a guy on a skateboard who can pump and go back and forth, I would think that that's much more efficient because you can, again,

the medium, you can kind of count on it. It stays the same. And whereas the medium on the snow, you know, it changes and your edge will change and your body position will change. I think if they could make a medium that would, you know, take wouldn't you wouldn't lose energy on transfer from your snowboard, that it might be more efficient. But it might be really difficult to do to do that. Would you need a specific type of snow? Would it be more ice and therefore harder? Or is it something as simple as that with the natural condition? Oh, that's a good question. And even outside of that, what's better, ice or powder? you're riding on a snowboard, you know, ice can be a very difficult thing to deal with because not only is it, you know, something that, you know, you think you could go faster and all this,

but the ruts that get into ice can cause you to lose an edge. And when you lose your edge, you know, gravity takes over and you slam and you can slam right to your knees and to your face, or you can go the other way and kind of land on your backside, which is, is equally painful. So, um, so I sometimes I think is, well, you might think because it has less friction would be a more ideal way and half pipes. They have this sort of, you know, they, they, they get sort of a, a happy medium. I think sometimes they don't want too much fresh snow. They want it to be kind of slick, but they don't want to be too grooved. For snowboarders, though, I think people like myself, you know, if you're not riding in a half pipe, the whole attraction is in the powder. And so free riding and working through the trees and things like that is more akin to, you know, powder riding, which I think in some ways may be less visually appealing to uh the general audience

but more appealing i think to to traditional snowboarders it's interesting yeah go on i'm still holding my face man when he said you go to your knees and you slam your i'm like not the face man please all of a sudden your face became the break yeah i'm like oh god this is the money maker baby it's interesting bill because you're saying that you're one of the few sports that i think i can encounter that actually incorporates friction as part of the the whole sport itself rather than saying we hate friction because it slows us down you're saying we're embracing friction because we need it to do the things that we're trying to achieve yeah exactly i think that you know we've talked about that in the sense of, you know,

when you're managing the forces of thrust, you know, or your momentum with friction or drag, you know, that's how you gain speed. And by having an unbalanced force in that general direction is how you go fast. And so in some ways, yeah, you'll see people, you know, you want a sharp edge, you want a slick bottom, and you want it to be as high a level of lack of friction, if you will. So there's less friction when you're working on your snowboard. And then you are managing it between sort of driving that edge, either, you know, pointing the edge into the mountain or turning your board and using the other edge to slow yourself down so yeah you're right i guess you know moving between moments of of high friction and low friction is how you manage yourself so you have to really embrace friction uh to be successful at snowboard is there a certain board design that allows you to do that or is it just basically

get the nearest baking tray take it to the the top of the mountain and head south? Yeah. No, I think they're generally, you know, the snowboard industry and the designs are quite elaborate, you know. But the basic, I think, idea is that, you know, you want something. It depends on the type of riding you're doing. But generally, let's say someone like myself, you know, who wants to be a center stance, that means I'm in the middle of my board so I can ride equally forwards and backwards. I'm going to have a board about the length of, you know, 160 centimeters or less with a contact edge throughout that allows me to do turns and things like that. So in some ways, if skateboards

are kind of this general popsicle shape that they call it, snowboards have that general kind of way too. Now, people who want to go fast, you know, just like in skateboarding, they're going to, you know, make a different design that's going to lock themselves in, maybe spread, be longer so that they can go faster. But for the general snowboard enthusiast who's riding maybe a center stance, they're going to ride something that is, you know, kind of clipped at both ends or looks like a big skateboard with a long contact edge. Well, all I know is this. From this point forward, I am never going to look at snowboarding the same until I see Sean White in a half pipe on a bacon sheet.

in a half pipe on a bacon sheet. Bill, you're probably familiar with the fact that Chuck likes to reinvent every single sport we bring into the show. Every sport we bring to this show, I try to find a way to make it more interesting. And Gary just gave me the greatest idea for the Olympics ever. It's just one event within,

kind of like the same way we have the decathlon. We have our half pipe. We have our downhill. we have the decathlon. We have our halfpipe. We have our downhill. We have our slalom. We have the moguls. And now, baking sheet. Damn right. Absolutely.

A little shake and bake on the mountain. Dr. Skateboard, he's going to stay with us, but we are going to talk to our old friend, Othello Clark, former professional skateboarder and snowboarder turned actor. Playing with Science is back with more snowboarding. Don't go away. Welcome back. I'm Gary O'Reilly. And I'm still Chuck Nice.

And this is still playing with science. And this is a special treat, not just for Chuck and I, but hopefully for you. We have both Othello Clarke, former professional snowboarder and actor from The Bold and the Beautiful. And of course, Dr. Skateboard. We've just been chatting before this section and the two guys realize how much they've got in common. So Othello, welcome back. Bill, glad you didn't go away. Thanks so much, Gary. You're welcome. Since you both do each sport, and Othello, we may have touched on this before, but I'm going to give you guys the Sophie's Choice. As of today, you can no longer do both. You have to choose one.

You can either snowboard or skateboard. And that's it. I'm an evil witch in a Disney film casting a spell upon you. And if you step on either the snowboard or the skateboard after you make the choice, you disappear forever. Have you been binging on the Disney Channel again? I love the Disney Channel. I love the Disney Channel. I love the Disney Channel. What can I say?

All right. So which one? Here's your selfie's choice. What do you choose, guys? Who wants to go first? Dr. Skateboard, why don't you go first? Yeah. Okay.

I'll go first. I'm happy to. So thank you, Othello. So great question. Easy one for me to answer. So I'm a skateboarder. You know, I'm going to continue to skateboard. I'm going to choose skateboarding. I enjoy snowboarding. You know, I lived in Colorado for a while. I lived in northern New Mexico.

I live in the desert now. So skateboarding is a big part of it. But skateboarding is something I started when I was 13 years old. And it's been sort of a lifeline for me throughout. It's how I see the world. It's pretty much, you know, I look at things around the world as a skateboarder. And so if I had to make a choice, I would always choose skateboarding and I continue to do so. Very definitive, quite, quite decisive. That's a commitment. Othello, Othello, your turn to play the game, my friend Well, you know I think I'm going to have to agree with Dr. Dave Dr. Dave

That's my chiropractor Dr. Skateboard You can agree with Dr. Dave if you want Let me tell you something You're going to love that plug right there As a professional snowboarder and skateboarder I can understand why your chiropractor is top of mind. He's always there. I drive past his office every day.

So, yeah, I probably agree with Dr. Skateboard. I'm a I'm a skateboarder for life. Oh, my God. He's got the tattoo right there. So skateboarding to me, everything that I've started stemmed from skateboarding. My whole life is from skateboarding. Everything, all the opportunities that have come my way have been from what from skateboarding has brought me. You know what I mean? My snowboarding, I learned from skateboarding. TV shows I'm on, skateboarding brought me there.

My son now skateboards. That's all I think about. So pretty much skateboarding. Don't get me wrong. My son now skateboards. That's all I think about. So pretty much skateboarding. Don't get me wrong. I love snowboarding. But at the end of the day, when you think of snowboarding and skateboarding, snowboarding, skateboarding, excuse me, is what everything stems from. And at the same time, skateboarding, you don't need a mountain. You don't need $500 snowboard, $1,000 outfit, $150 ski pass. You don't need any of that with, $1,000 outfit, $150 ski pass. You don't need any of that with skateboarding.

You just need your board and wheels and some concrete anywhere. So to me, I think it'd be skateboarding 100%. First love, true love. First love, true love. There you go. Okay, I want to play a little game right now. Since this is a show where we marry sports and science. Don't worry, guys.

I'm not going to marry you guys. Okay. Even though, thank God, we live in a country where that can now happen. Let me just say this. I have the sports in Othello. I have the science in you, Dr. Bill. And so what I want Othello, you to do is give us your favorite snowboarding trick, whether it's one you can do or not, your favorite snowboarding trick.

And then, Doc, I want you to break down the physics behind that trick. All right. Can we do that? Yeah. All right. Othello, what's your favorite trick? Right now, my favorite trick is probably a switch backside under flip. Holy crap. So go ahead and explain that, please, because I know what it is. I'm just saying.

I'll tell the truth. I haven't a clue, but I'm going to learn before the end of this show. So go on, Dr. Bill. Go ahead. I mean, go ahead. Othello, explain the trick first, and then Dr. Bill, explain the physics. Go ahead, Othello, explain the trick first, and then Dr. Bill, explain the physics. A switch backside underflip is I come up to the last jump in the park, the money booter,

which the money booter is where you win the money at in a big contest, so it's called money booter. I got to tell you something, it's something else in the adult films that I watch, but go ahead. In the adult films that I watch, but go ahead. So I go to that last jump, you know, coming in pretty hot. And then right about 20 yards, 20 feet, 20 yards before the jump, I jump switch, which switch means backwards. And then I go into the jump backwards, going full speed. And then I do a under flip, which is a front flip, but under. So instead of going forward and doing the flip, I'm going backwards. So I'm doing the flip still, but I'm doing it backwards, so it's under. And then in the air, I do a 180, and I turn back, and I land forward.

Wow. All righty. All yours, Dr. Bill. So real quick, I wanted to ask Oththello are you regular foot or goofy foot going in i going in after i hit switch i go in regular but i am goofy but i ride most of my tricks are done switch because regular is kind of too easy now i i try to challenge myself with everything backwards now okay wow awesome little humble brag going on right there. It is what it is. It is what it is. I'm just saying, like, you know, I mean, you know, goofy is a little too easy.

So, you know, I think that echoes also a progression that goes on in skateboarding where you're really trying to master that you can go in both directions. So I can applaud a fellow for taking that approach in his snowboarding. So when he talks about it, he's Goofy Foot. He's riding down the mountain. He said he was going really fast. So he's pointing himself straight down, lowering himself, getting as much speed as he can. And then he says he's about 20 yards away from the jump. He does a hop.

He does a 180. So he switches to a regular stance. So he's got to maintain a speed while he's making that transition, keeping that center of gravity right over the board. So he doesn't hit his edge or wobble his board. So he can go right into the money booter as he called it. So he rides into the money booter. And then as he hits the lift, you know, he's lifting off of that. So he's using the lift. He's going to deal with gravity, which is going to pull on him. And as he's flipping, you know, that's when we talked about the spinning. So he's managing those forces, that centripetal force, which is,

you know, pushing in on him and that centripetal force, which wants to flee out by probably adjusting his arms to hold his moment of inertia intact that he can go through it. And then as he comes out of the spin, he's, again, switching a 180. So he's using both sort of a rotational axis as well, you know, up and down, as well as one from the side. So he's making it very complex. But the big point, I bet, is if you watched him spin, doing the flip and then doing the 180, you're going to see that his center of gravity is very close to his board and that he can manage that as he goes through.

So if he's in a tight area with his center of gravity over his board, then he makes that trick every time. Wow. Hey, Othello, does that sound even better once it's broken down with the science yeah it's exactly right on um it comes to a point where you get so so used to that trick and it's so embedded in your brain and your feet and and muscle memory that i feel more comfortable going upside down than i do going straight um because i can close my eyes when I'm in the air and through experience and through doing it over and over again, I can just close my eyes and do the trick and know where to land and then open my eyes and land the trick just because I've done it so much.

Dr. What sort of talk is Othello getting involved with because he's on a multi-axis here for these two tricks or this whole trick so um so i think the thing he hit on that's really important is you know he's he's he's he's doing all this complex physics but the other side of it is he talks about how he's just entering into this flow this space where he's actually able to do this and what you see there i think is you know he's he's putting all this energy into this trick but he's actually able to do this. And what you see there, I think, is he's putting all this energy into this trick, but he's also, if you will, once he's in the trick, sort of conserving his energy and making his moves quite defined and quite natural. So this is kind of an interesting thing about the science of sports is you can break it down with all the physics you can,

of sports is you can break it down with all the physics you can. But in some ways, the guy or girl who's managing the physics, they find sort of a way of flow, or he termed it muscle memory as well, but I would use the term flow, where he can kind of go, he knows the feeling, and the feeling is what he's striving for rather than breaking it down through the science. Oh, wow. Go ahead, Othello. Go ahead. You know, if I don't land the trick, I knew that I wasn't going to land it within the millisecond after I left the ground because it wasn't right. My body tells me, oh, my gosh, I'm about to eat it or I got this. Just because of the flow, like Dr. Skateboard was saying, it's a memory thing. And when you got that flow going nothing can stop you holy max how often do you complete a whole course feeling exactly as you've just explained

do you ever get a perfect rise do that nine times out of ten no no yeah you know that that's the whole you know i just put my i put my music on and i flow wait a minute people i tell people you know if there's something that you're skeptical about and you're snowboarding or skateboarding the only thing that you really can do is take a deep breath and flow like water hey man wait did i just hear you say that while you're doing your run, you're actually listening to music? Oh yeah. I can't, I really can't ride without it. Dude, that's awesome. It helps for that flow. So now I'm in a zone and I forget about the mechanics of everything that I'm doing. I'm letting my body take over because I'm in that flow. And if there's a good jam on, you can expect some

big banger tricks for sure. That is hot. What works best in the cans for you, Othello? What works best? What's your favorite song? What works best in the cans for you to get your flow? Oh, man. You know what? It just depends. If it's a powder day, I don't know.

I like to listen to some electronic music because I'm going through it fast. If it's a sunny day and everybody's out having a blast, then more than likely I'm listening to some upbeat reggae music. Nice. Got that vibe going on. I don't know if you noticed, but I have dreadlocks. Yeah.

Oh, now you mention it. That's a part of my whole life, so that's mostly what I listen to. But if I'm charging it, I go through the whole electronic scene. Well, get up, stand up. My man is doing it. Oh, yeah. I love it.

I love it. And by the way, my song, when I'm going through my run, I am Woman to Hear Me Roar by Helen Reddy. Thank you. And if it's me, it's definitely the Beatles and it's going to be hell. Right, guys. So thank you. We put the band back together. Yeah, man.

This is great. What a great snowboarding show. Thank you. Thanks so much, guys. So thank you. We put the band back together. Yeah, man, this is great. What a great snowboarding show. Thank you. Absolutely. Thank you. Dr. Snowboard, a.k.a. Professor Bill Robinson. And of course, the one and only Othello Clark. What a pleasure. What an absolute pleasure. Absolutely. Thank you. Thanks so much, guys.

Yeah. Thank you so much. You're welcome. All right. That's been Playing With Science, Chuck. Another awesome show. Isn't it, Justin? Yeah, I'm about to go hit the slopes right now. You do that, and I'll tidy up the studio.

Right, that's it from our snowboarding show. Look forward to your company soon. Bye, bye, bye, bye.